Cats have an innate desire to sharpen their claws on most household articles of furniture, much to the dismay of the cat owner. Cats also have an affinity for scratching woven pile carpet to the extent of literally destroying selected areas of carpeting whether wall-to-wall or freely laid.
Cat scratching posts and exercise devices have been the subject of U.S. patents, see for example U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,993.027; 3,604,397; 3,479,990; 3,097,626; 3,085,551 and 2,997,019.
In current vogue is a cat scratching post in the form of an upright cylindrical wood member mounted to an underlying base and covered on its exterior with a piece of standard pile carpeting. Under such circumstances, the cat stands on its hind legs, with its body arched towards the carpet covered post and the cat rapidly scratches the surface of the pile carpet material. While such cat scratching post appears to be adequate and solves the cat's need for scratching to sharpen its claws, it provides little in the way of a device furthering exercise by the cat.
It is therefore, a primary object of the present invention to provide an improved cat scratching post which acts additionally as an exercise or fitness center permitting a variety of exercises to take the place limited only by the dexterity and imagination of the cat.